Joe Soucheray tries — and fails — to understand absentee ballots

Right-wing crank Joe Soucheray doesn’t know much about absentee ballots — except that more Democrats seem to use them, which makes them evil and un-democratic. In a column in the Pioneer Press, Soucheray starts out by completely misrepresenting how absentee ballots were counted during the recount:

The Coleman team — which, of course, initially rejected the idea to count absentee ballots — now wishes to count even more of them. The appeal will have to say, “Look, I was the winner until the rejected absentee ballots started to get counted and now that I am the loser, what was that all about? Why aren’t we taking a look at all rejected absentee ballots?”

Maybe Soucheray was so busy with his radio show that he missed it. We did take a look at all rejected absentee ballots. In fact, we looked at many twice. Some were rejected improperly, and those were counted in the recount. Some were rejected properly, and those were not counted, because they were not valid votes. Isn’t that how it should work? Perhaps Soucheray would like us to count all of the invalid votes — or at least the ones that are votes for Coleman.

Soucheray uses his misinformed, inaccurate understanding of absentee ballots to draw a dangerous conclusion: He argues that we should make it harder, rather than easier, for Minnesotans to vote:

Beware of elections officials — secretary of state types — bearing the gift of even more absentee voting. With the exception of the absent military, why should absentee voting be made available to anybody who wants to avoid the possibility of standing in line on Election Day? That takes us away from our responsibility and privilege to vote, not closer.

It boggles my mind that Soucheray really thinks making it difficult to vote would be good for our democracy. Especially these days, it can be difficult for many Americans to make it to the polls. Many people work two jobs or odd hours, or lack access to transportation. Making it as easy as possible for them to vote can only enhance our democracy.

We’re asking for trouble in appealing to the marginal voter, the citizen only so casually interested in an election that he or she will only vote if a ballot is as convenient to them as a free coupon for a fish sandwich.

So Soucheray’s theory, as I understand it here, is that making voting more difficult will mean that only the most responsible voters will make it to the polls. In that case, why stop there? We could further increase the quality of our voters by offering them ten dollars not to vote. Or perhaps we could stop disclosing the locations of the polls, and only give votes to those who take the time to find them.

This is the modern Republican party in action. The only electoral strategy left to them is to try to drive down turnout, so the impact of their base will be magnified. I believe we should do everything we can — short of bribing citizens to vote — to make it easier to vote and increase turnout.

Soucheray tries to point to the Senate recount as support for his anti-voting proposal:

This mess, this long sordid mess, is due to absentee ballots… responsible voters are the ones who get disenfranchised.

But it’s not due to absentee ballots at all. Ruling on absentee ballots took only days. This “long sordid mess” is due to Norm Coleman’s refusal to accept reality. Coleman’s intransigence would be a terrible reason to start denying Minnesotans the right to cast their ballots.